I’ve recently been working on the development of a BA (Hons) Degree in Digital Media at Coventry School of Art and Design. It’s a brand new degree exploring media design, storytelling, digital arts and digital culture.

Students will be working on convergent media projects in content production, moving-image, storytelling, speculative design and a number of related areas across the digital arts. Designed for learners who want to be hybrid-media artists, creative professionals and entrepreneurs in the increasing pervasive digital realm.

First year modules will explore digital culture, convergent multimedia production, digital publishing, storytelling and creative technology. The year will culminate in an intensive ‘creative hack lab’ project where students put their problem solving, innovation and design skills to the test with a live brief.

The second year will explore the creative and critical side of the digital arts, along with modules in digital advertising, transmedia storytelling and opportunities to undertake professional experience. There will also be options to develop skills in other areas of media production, including photography, experimental media and short film as well as opportunities to undertake visits with international partner organisations.

The final year will focus on critical digital research methods, exploring how to use creative technologies for research and the creation of new forms of knowledge, products and artistic expression. Students will then use their skills to develop a final research project, aimed at creating cutting-edge experiences and speculative possibilities for the future.

The degree is underpinned by an interdisciplinary approach to the design and analysis of digital culture and media, drawing on a range of methodologies from the digital and media arts, sciences, business and creative computing subject areas. It will be addressing the implications, challenges and possibilities of living in a world of disruptive innovation, peer 2 peer collaboration, connected devices, augmentation, pervasive storytelling, automation, big data and the internet of things and exploring this through projects that challenge and critique it.

Students will be involved in live projects, real industry and cultural briefs and working simulations that are informed by problem-based, activity-led and challenge-based learning methodologies. This will be supported by technology-enhanced learning approaches in a department that is internationally recognised for its innovative approach to learning design.

If you are interested in finding out about the degree please get in touch – you can find me on twitter and linked-in.

To find out more about the digital media research work in the Department of Media please visit the Centre for Disruptive Media website.

Following on from our Open Class in Creative Activism, we’ve decided to think about how we can use some of the working practices we developed to explore other areas on our curriculum.

So this October we are launching the ‘Cine Collective‘- which is an Open Undergraduate Class exploring and experimenting with Digital Cinematography.

Over the course of 10 weeks we will be looking at a variety of approaches to studying, practicing and interrogating cinematography. Alongside this, the participants on the course will work on a series of cinematic responses to weekly creative briefs- that will contribute to form a showreel of work by the end of the class. Students are asked to openly post their response to each task to our community.

It’s an exciting time for ‘Open Teaching’ in Film, with a number of organisations and universities opening up their doors and helping to change the way that education is structured in the 21st Century. Surely it won’t be long until there is a very real prospect of undertaking a truly ‘distributed’ degree- choosing the best and most appropriate courses from around the world, to create some kind of educational playlist. There’s a lot of potential here for something truly digital, and radical, to emerge. It’s really exciting to see projects such as the Peer 2 Peer University, Coursera, OERU and Mozilla’s Open Badges gaining momentum in this area- each taking a different approach and model to rethinking education.

In the meantime here are a few other open classes that you might want to explore next academic year….

Living Books About Life is a series of curated, open access books about life — with life understood both philosophically and biologically — which provide a bridge between the humanities and the sciences. Produced by a globally-distributed network of writers and editors, the books in the series repackage existing open access science research by clustering it around selected topics whose unifying theme is life such as air, agriculture, bioethics, cosmetic surgery, electronic waste, energy, neurology and pharmacology.

By creating twenty one ‘living books about life’ in just seven months, the series represents an exciting new model for publishing, in a sustainable, low-cost manner, many more such books in the future. These books can be freely shared with other academic and non-academic institutions and individuals. Taken together, they constitute an engaging interdisciplinary resource for researching and teaching relevant science issues across the humanities, a resource that is capable of enhancing the intellectual and pedagogic experience of working with open access materials.

All the books in the series are themselves ‘living’, in the sense that they are open to ongoing collaborative processes of writing, editing, updating, remixing and commenting by readers. As well as repackaging open access science research — along with interactive maps, visualisations, podcasts and audio-visual material — into a series of books, Living Books About Life is thus engaged in rethinking ‘the book’ itself as a living, collaborative endeavour in the age of open science, open education, open data and e-book readers such as Kindle and the iPad. The book that I worked on, along with Janneke Adema, explored the way that concepts and ideas around the theme of Symbiosis can be applied to a number of areas within the (digital/networked) humanities.

Living Books About Life is a collaboration between Open Humanities Press and three academic institutions: Coventry University, Goldsmiths, University of London, and the University of Kent. Funded by the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC), and published by Open Humanities Press (OHP) (http://openhumanitiespress.org). The Editors of the series are Clare Birchall (University of Kent), Gary Hall (Coventry University), Joanna Zylinska (Goldsmiths, University of London). Other members of the project team include Sigi Jőttkandt (Open Humanities Press), David Ottina (Open Humanities Press) and myself (Coventry University).

The class explores the potentials of creative media activism through encouraging the creation of ‘live’ creative interventions and participation in cultural, political and social debates.

Looking at how media activists and campaigners have used their media knowledge, creativity and community building skills to ask difficult questions, provoke debate and raise awareness of important issues and problems in their local, national and international communities.

The class is supported by a range of collaborators and guest speakers who are changing the world. So far our participants include:

By being run as an open community it will enable participants to constructively critique, learn from, build on and collaborate with each other to produce a body of work that will, hopefully, make a practical and positive mark on the world.

Was checking out the camp and taking some shots yesterday outside St Pauls Cathedral and was fortunate enough to catch this inspiring speech by retired labour politician Tony Benn at #OccupyLSX during my break.

Rushed an edit together last night, let me know your thoughts, i didnt have a tripod so its a bit shaky. Song is called Mercury Fingerprint by Dan Skinner (from Audio Networks)

The beta App allows people to engage with the community of practitioners and students who are taking part in the course. Pulling in photographs from Flickr, content from the blog, comments from Twitter as well as a range of photography podcasts from our iTunes U Project.

The intention is to see whether mobile applications can enhance the experience of being involved in the course and to help us to think about future developments in this area as part of our mantra for Open Media at Coventry University. Since the launch of this app, we have been involved in developing a number of innovations for mobile based learning, including the launch of the MediaPRO – Media Production Course App

(The image at the top and on my homepage – Crash Courtesy of Jonathan Shaw)

The Picbod App was developed as a part of my Postgraduate Certificate in Higher Education. You can find the poster presentation of the PICBOD App here. Thanks to all the colleagues, students and other people who were involved in its development.

I’ve recently been experimenting with a drone and 3d Text Match-Moving as part of a new critical video project around data and surveillance. This project has since evolved into the hacked/hyper cinema speculative design project which is currently under construction

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Large parts of the UK are currently being licensed for Hydraulic Fracturing, Underground Coal Gasification and Coal Bed Methane Extraction. A growing base of evidence is showing that these technologies could have a massive impact on the environment, as well as on the health of people and wildlife. Despite this, it seems that planning applications are being allowed to go ahead with very little debate, and consent, from the people who it will directly impact upon.

The Liverpool, Wirral and Merseyside campaign to raise awareness has received considerable community support so far. It even managed to get a mention by Yoko One, who is an eminent campaigner against the tide of fracking across the globe. A number of other merseyside bands are also supporting the campaign.

Liquid-Cinema is a visual art/technology project that is exploring the potential of inserting fluid and manipulable layers into the visual imagery of film in the cinema. This technology will effectively enable film audiences to become part of the narrative imagery and story of the ‘mass-distributed’ film itself. Enabling filmmakers and distributors to develop new kinds of narrative experiences and database driven hyper-localisation for their stories and back-catalogues.

It is an attempt at creating a participatory cinema, one that is open to audience and contextual engagement in a number of fluid and dynamic ways. It builds on the practical and theoretical work in the broad area of the study, and practice, of transmedia storytelling and the digital arts.

It’s aim is to apply it to the creation of new narrative experiences, as well as enabling cinematic archives and back-catalogues to be reconceived and remediated and potentially resold as new versions. On top of this there will also be potential to integrate the hyper-localisation of advertising and product placement content in the background of film itself. A film that becomes aware

Here are some of the illustrations from the thinking behind the project so far (created by Illustrator Catherine Askew)….

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This is a research-led teaching project to develop a micro-budget feature film experience working with students and a number of collaborators:

‘Latitude’ is a satire about two technology fanatics whose lives are about to change, a tiny little bit, as they descend into a bizarre reality in their geeky hunt to find the world’s ultimate technology, which they believe is hidden in a game called Geocaching.

It is currently in production in the UK and USA and deals with issues around technology, reality and sanity. It hopes to go beyond-the screen, so expect some innovations and experiments as the film progresses.

Stay tuned for updates as the film progresses. We will also do a proper trailer once we get closer to releasing the movie, alongside a ‘Making of…’.

Production – Mick Le Mare, Rebecca Pittam, Richard Neal, Jake Humbles, Ross Varney, Adam Davies, Sam Soane, Alex Hacking, James Colley, Suzi Globe and many many more marvellous people who have helped us along the way.

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I have worked on a range of advertising projects and integrated marketing campaigns over the years. My role as Creative Multimedia Manager included setting up a multimedia department, that now has over 10 people in it, at Coventry University working on print, video, social media, podcasting, website and other content marketing initiatives. Many of these campaigns made Coventry University an early adopter of digital and social media for marketing purposes

These projects cover national and international student recruitment, fundraising campaigns, research marketing and internal communications for a number of stakeholders.

I instigated and project managed a number of major initiatives during this time, including:

CUTV- a Youtube channel fully integrated into the Coventry University web strategy, that has had over 3 Million views since we launched it in 2008. I created most of the videos here.

CU on iTunes U- a podcasting initiative that helped to put Coventry University on the Map in iTunes. This has had over 16 million downloads since we launched in 2009

CU Social Media. I set up and developed the strategy for the Coventry University Social Media including running and analysing the Twitter and Facebook accounts. In 2009 we were highly commended in the ‘HEIST Awards for Educational Marketing’ for the integrated nature of this work

Examples of major campaigns I developed during this role included:

“The Start of Something Big” fundraising campaign- in order to get government and business support for a £100 Million capital development I developed a campaign that included a brochure, video and a presentation presented at Whitehall and with various development agencies and investors.

Launching the London Campus- developing marketing and web content for the launch of a brand new campus in London, that now has thousands of students studying MBA programmes.

‘Hear My Story’ An NHS funded campaign to get more people into Occupational Therapy

BMW/Mini Videos- Promoting BMWs sponsorship of the 2012 London Olympics with case studies of athletes in the West Midlands Region

Whose Shoes- a video marketing project for a new innovation in social care

ACT UK- videos for a new virtual reality training centre for the construction industry

Institute of Community Cohesion- various podcasts and video projects developed to promote the work of the centre

NHS Live- a series of videos to promote innovation in the NHS.

Same But Different- a DVD/Brochure training pack on managing Diversity and Inequality in Education, funded by HEFCE

Blueprint- a film guide to European Structural Funding, funded by Add+vantage West Midlands

Live streaming projects include directing multi-camera events for a variety of conferences and events including ‘Climate Change Solutions’ at the NEC, the ‘Coventry, Solihull and Warwickshire Sports Awards’ at the Ricoh Arena, ‘Play the Game’ Sports Conference at Coventry Cathedral, ‘Creative Pie’ at the Belgrade Theatre and a ‘Virgin Media sponsored gig’ at London Astoria

I have also created projects for Warwickshire Council, Coventry Council and many more